Before you run to restore that deleted Public Folder from tape don’t forget ExFolders.

I recently had a situation where someone had inadvertently deleted a Public Folder. I had previously downloaded ExFolders for another problem and remembered I had this on the server. [Read more…] about Don’t forget ExFolders

Storage system [FOM NAME] ([IP ADDRESS]) did not join the management group [MANAGEMENT GROUP NAME].

The required directory /etc/lefthand/data is not mounted. Please restore OS using recovery media.

I ran into this error recently while trying to add a HP LeftHand Failover Manager (running on Hyper-V) to a management group with two HP LeftHand VSAs (running on VMware ESXi 5.1). We were using SAN iQ 10.5.

I had to use it recently when our existing BES server was getting squished on resources and I needed to move the Blackberry Enterprise Server role onto a new box.

So, if you don’t want to force all your users through the pain of reactivating their phones, or, the hassle of recreating all your IT policies, then you definitely want to use the Transporter. It’s a great tool and can be downloaded as part of the Blackberry Resource Kit.

I was recently building a VMware ESXi multi-host environment with a LeftHand Virtual SAN and I needed 6 Port Groups for my design. I already had one pre-existing Port Group that was a 2GB uplink to my Layer 3 switch.

Everything was going great until I tried to create Port Group number 7. This seemed odd to me as I knew my IOS version should at least support 128 Port Channel Groups.

After some digging I discovered this 2960G only supports 6 Port Channel Groups. This was unfortunate but not a deal breaker. I knew I would not be using Vmotion very often on this cluster so I let that run on a single Gigabit Ethernet port. This allowed me to re-architect my solution for only 4 Port Channel Groups.

Just thought I’d pass this one along. You don’t often see switches restricted to this few port-groups.

So, I finally got to set up my first Gen8 server. It is a ProLiant DL360e Gen8. Two actually. At first I was very happy with all the new advancements. No more searching for a SmartStart CD you say! Brilliant! No more confusion on SmartStart version compatibility? Wicked! (Yes, there is a VERY fine line of SmartStart CD’s that will support both a ProLiant DL360 G4p and putting Server 2008 R2 on it – I like to live dangerously!). So, as many of you already know Intelligent Provisioning replaced SmartStart CD’s. The cool part is, you just boot right into it. Its an option – F10 at POST. Neat huh? And it looks so sharp too. (Check the image below)

HP Intelligent Provising Maintenance Tasks

They have this neat feature called Firmware Update that will direct connect to HP.com (or a local update server) and get all your firmware updates for you. Very neat. Especially useful if are using a OS like VMware ESXi. So I configured the network settings on both my servers and got the error in the screenshot below.

HP Intellgient Provisioning Firmware Update Fail

I checked my settings a dozen times on both servers, tried different IPs, different NIC ports on the server and sadly no luck. It just wouldn’t connect. I called HP and the first tech has me update from v1.30 to v1.40.88. Sadly this did not help. I called back (different tech this time) and they told me this is a known issue with certain servers running certain system firmware versions and that they are working on it.

Insert sad face. 🙁

This seems like a really cool feature. Just wish I could test it. Until then, I will be going back to downloading the bootable Service Pack for ProLiant DVD.

UPDATED: This same option also exists in Backup Exec 2014. These instructions are also the same for 2014. However, in 2014 there is also a checkbox where you can disable this feature. Click here for a screenshot.

I ran across this issue recently when troubleshooting why four removable backup drives in a drive pool kept going into read-only mode at seemingly random intervals. Initially I would go into the drive properties, switch the drive to allow write operations, only for it go back to read-only just a few weeks later.

My client was using 4 removable USB drives in a rotation. These drives were all in one drive pool in Backup Exec. They would swap the drives out weekly, so each drive would be offline for as much as 3 weeks.

I thought I would post on this feature because it seems it is often overlooked and not everyone is aware it exists. This feature is the Global Exclusions Selection List in Backup Exec and it has been around for a very long time.

This global selection list allows you to exclude a path or file just once and this exclusion will automatically apply to every job you create. This is a lot easier than deselecting the same check box for a common exclusion across dozens of servers and jobs.

This came to light recently because I had to add global exclusions for the Symantec EndPoint Protection 12.1 client, which kept causing a dozens of exceptions in my job and I really didn’t need to recover this program data in the event of a catastrophic event. I could simply reinstall the client if needed.

I have a couple of earlier posts from January and February that discuss Symantec looking at bringing back Job-Centric jobs back as an option in Backup Exec 2012. However, it seems like this won’t be happening in the next major service pack. Symantec has announced beta testing for Service Pack 2 for Backup Exec 2012 (and Service Pack 3 for the former Backup Exec 2010).

Aside from the standard slew of hotfixes it appears the following, at first glance, will be officially supported in both Backup Exec 2010 and 2012.

Windows Server 2012

SQL 2012 Service Pack 1

SQL 2008 R2 Service Pack 2

Exchange 2010 Service Pack 3

VMWare VSphere 5.1

In addition Backup Exec 2012 Service Pack 2 will also support. (Backup Exec 2010 will not support these features.)